


two’s a tango, three’s a crowd, four’s a party.

by degenerateink



Category: Far Cry (Video Games), Far Cry 5
Genre: Angst, Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Love, Smut, polyamory!Seeds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-23
Updated: 2018-11-23
Packaged: 2019-08-28 04:14:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16716422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/degenerateink/pseuds/degenerateink
Summary: When the dust has settled, when peace has been established between The Resistance and Eden’s Gate, the two halves melding together, coalescing into the singular Hope County, and the brothers catch wind of Rook’s plans to leave the county - the state - they’re devastated. And react accordingly.TL:DR - Rook’s job is done and there’s talk of her leaving Hope County. The Seeds don’t like this. Not. One. Bit.





	two’s a tango, three’s a crowd, four’s a party.

This is bad.

This is very, very bad.

Rook wasn’t supposed to get this close.

Three months ago, she got called out to Hope County to arrest a fucking madman raving about the end of the world, kidnapping people like a backwards Noah prepping his reluctant ark, stealing supplies from those that opposed him and his fucking cult because that’s exactly what it is.

Was. 

But things have cleared up - regarding the cult, at least - an understanding has been met. 

Joseph gets to keep preaching, babbling about the end of the world, procuring supplies for the bunkers peppered throughout the county for when the time comes, when they will prosper underground for seven years until the world has been reborn, where The Gates of Eden await.

But the kidnapping and forced converting stops. 

•

Faith’s Bliss fields have been burnt to nothing but ash, she’s persuaded to give up her siren ways, to be a helpful, happy convert who helps out around The Henbane, especially for those who have struggled with addiction and/or abuse. 

(The withdrawal from Bliss would’ve been hell, but Rook had a good friend who owed her a helluva lot of favors. 

Which she decided to cash-in after all these years with a single request.

Crates of the best Mary Jane sent to Hope County, Montana every month.)

•

(“Well, it’s official — this area is hereby known as Dope County, Montana.”

Rook isn’t sure where she found it - if it was stashed up her ass, or tucked under her shirt, or just materialized out of thin-fucking-air - but Jess hurls The Book of Joseph at her head for that glorious pun, while Sharky cackles like a deranged hyena.

Totally worth the near-death concussion.)

•

Jacob’s compound is going strong, with the soldiers that Rook hadn’t killed - culled - leading the training, because by this point, only the strongest were left. 

People willingly joined up with him, seeing how capable and prepared his soldiers were for the worst, whether it happened or not. 

And that‘d been the only problem before — that he’d been stealing people from their homes, from their stores, from their streets and forcing them to kill each other in his twisted Darwinistic trials. 

But if they’re joining of their own volition? 

Absolutely legal. 

Well, killing each other might not be, but they pointedly decide to overlook that little detail for two reasons.

1.) The people know what they’re signing up for. 

2.) Forgoing that little detail - i.e. the murders and such - saves the sheriff’s department from an exorbitant amount of paperwork.

•

John continues his role as The Baptist of Eden’s Gate, holding confessions, baptisms, cleansings - there just isn’t as much death involved. 

Pain, yes. 

Tattoos, yes. 

Carving sins into flesh, not as much, but for the extremists who asked nicely - yes.

•

Rook’s job is done.

About a week after everything’s been said and done - after a treaty’s been implemented between Eden’s Gate and The Resistance, Rook and Joseph shaking hands that there’d be no more violence, no more bloodshed, no more religion shoved anyone’s throat unless they asked for it themselves - Rook’s kicking back at The Spread Eagle with Nick, Jerome and Mary May, who ask what she plans to do next.

Whitehorse, Pratt and Hudson had all left earlier that day, leaving Rook to watch over the county - just for a few weeks, to ensure that the treaty stays in place, which she doesn’t mind because this spared her three weeks’ of paperwork, trying to hide the whole debacle from the media, having to deal with IAB.

Rook’s polishing off her fifth beer (Nick is determined to drink her under the table, but his words are beginning to slur to the point that he isn’t speaking in run-on sentences - the words are bleeding into each other, a gaggle of syllables that would’ve been indecipherable without his passionate gesticulation) when she mentions that Whitehorse is sending recommendations left-and-right to the big cities - Los Angeles, Houston, New York City - all across the country, because after everything she’s done, endured, he thinks that she’d make an outstanding detective. 

“You’re leavin’ us, Dep?” Nick’s words aren’t slurred, but they are heavy - thick with emotion, but alcohol tends to bring out the tears in Nicholas Rye.

“Jesus, don’t say it like that, Nick. You make it sound like I’m abandoning you.”

“Well, that’s good, because that’s how it feels!”

Jerome gives Nick a stern but patient look. 

“Nick. The things Rook’s done for us... Your family, our valley, this county… Don’t you think she deserves a change of scenery?”

“Well… O’ course… Rook, you deserve that and a helluva lot more,” Nick sniffs, his cap hiding his face, but that’s just as bad as seeing him tear-up.

Rook slings an arm around his shoulder, tucks him against her side for as much of a hug as she can manage while they’re seated at the bar.

“Knock it off, Rye. You’re going to turn me into a sap.” 

“What brought you to Montana in the first place, Rook? First time I laid eyes on you, thought you’d stumbled into the wrong state,” Mary teases, subtly nudging the bourbon in Rook’s direction, to which she takes the hint and empties what was left of it in her glass, filling it to the brim. 

That was enough drinking for their pilot. 

Rook stares down at her full glass, watches beads of condensation drip down, idly brushes them away with her thumb before they could stain the wood of the bar. 

* “… Y’know those old Westerns... Where those cowboys make a run for the border?” 

Nick peers up from his cap as Jerome hums thoughtfully and a small smile comes to Mary’s face as she nods. 

Must’ve triggered a memory from better days, when her family was whole and could enjoy watching classics in peace, without threats of a cult or the end of the world outside their door. 

* “... I‘m looking for my Mexico.” 

Rook thinks of blue eyes - three different pairs, all of them so very different but so much alike - so beautiful, so haunted, so devastated. 

She hopes that they can find peace in what was salvaged. 

Because when everything is said and done, at the end of the day, they aren’t bad people.

They’re broken people - brothers - who’d done bad things because they’d never been given as much as a taste of something good, something normal, something healthy - they didn’t get the help they needed and acclimated accordingly. 

“... This ain’t it?” Nick asks quietly, too quietly, so uncharacteristic of his character. 

Though part of Rook argues that it’s the booze that’s making Nick emotional, that’s starting to make her emotional, a different part of her snarls at her that he has a point. 

This is the closest thing to refuge, to peace, to sanctuary she’s had in years. 

Is she really going to walk away from that? 

“Regardless, Rook...” Jerome’s voice is soft but strong, like it’s always been, that anchor in the storm that saves you from disappearing in the dark, the lighthouse that guides you back home.

“Know that whatever you decide… You are the savior of Hope County, and we’ll always be here to welcome our hero home.”

Jerome’s words strike a chord that has tears stinging in the back of her eyes, but she blinks them back and clinks her glass against his, Mary’s, Nick’s (who doesn’t realize it’s empty until he’s tipping it back and his mouth stays dry, the rest of them nearly spitting their drink out at his confused whine). 

Rook decidedly doesn’t linger over the fact that the word ‘home’ has her thinking about tattooed arms, burnt skin and yellow aviators. 

No, she just downs her bourbon and asks May for a refill.

Time to numb herself for an hour or two or fifteen. 

•

The Seeds, well... 

They don’t like this information.

Not. One. Bit. 

Joseph is heartbroken.

Jacob is livid.

John is both. 

They can’t let their deputy leave. Not after everything that’s happened. She’d pieced, glued, fixed their broken family.

How could she abandon them after making them whole again?

•

Rook’s head is pounding like a fucking bass-line, brain thudding against her skull hard enough to make her eyes ache, her thoughts - muddled, fleeting as they are - tangible and painful. 

More than that, her arms are sore - muscles burning, hissing, crackling - and when Rook tries to jostle them, she finds that her wrists are bound in thick, unyielding rope above her head, tied to the frame of an achingly familiar bed, the sheets beneath her skin producing a delicious contrast to the numb pain in her tied limbs that she isn’t able to appreciate properly because she is a slab of meat dangling before carnivores, ready to be devoured by beasts. 

“What… Where…”

Someone places a finger to her lips, silencing Rook effectively.

“You’re safe, darling,” he coos, large, calloused hands caressing her face like a priceless gem, peppering kisses along the rim of her jaw, the plane of her cheek, the line of her nose. 

The voice is familiar, achingly so, but Rook’s thoughts are jumbled, her hearing is questionable and her tongue is too heavy for her mouth. 

His fingers ease down, coil around Rook’s throat, not hard enough to constrict her windpipe, but just so that her pulse thrashes beneath them. 

“... You were going to leave us.”

“… John?” 

His breath is hot, wet against the base of her throat, his tongue lapping at the dip of Rook’s collarbone, inducing a shudder that makes him smile against her skin. 

“We couldn’t have that, sweet girl. You’re part of the family. You’re ours.” 

“No, I— ahhh,” she hisses as John bites sharply into the juncture of her neck and shoulder, effectively cutting off that train of thought, hard enough that she feels the skin break beneath his teeth, stifles a moan as his tongue laves over the wound, at the euphoric groan that echoes in his chest as the taste of her blood spills across his palate. 

“You know you belong here. With us. Why are you fighting this, baby girl?” A deep, gruff voice sounds in her ear, a pair of hands engraved with thick callouses circling Rook’s waist, kneading at her hips, holding her against a hard wall of muscle, a sturdy chest, rough lips meeting the back of her neck as his fingers reach down, down, down— 

“J-Jacob, fuck—“

It’s too much. 

It’s too much, but not enough. 

So many conflicting feelings rage through her - get away, come closer, hands off, touch me, fuck off, fuck me - and it just aggravates Rook’s throbbing skull.

Only it isn’t pain, but unadulterated pleasure flooding her brain cells, nerve endings, bone marrow. 

Large hands come to cradle her face - the softest touch of them all, as if her skin were porcelain. 

“You are the divine gift of my visions. That God Himself bestowed upon us in our desperate time of need. Right as we thought the earth was wrought with drought, you come to us, an oasis in this desert. You have renewed us with purpose, with meaning, with love. You are our guardian angel.” 

Joseph kisses her, savors the feel of Rook’s soft, chapped lips against his, has to remind himself to not lose himself in this perfection - not here, not now - that he’ll have plenty of time to get acquainted with the intricacies of her body, to learn what would make her writhe beneath him, what would make her plead for more, what would convince her that she is theirs and theirs alone.

But he’d prefer to do that in private. 

So, for the time being, it’s only fair that his brothers enjoy her. 

Because he’ll be taking his time with her. 

Pressing their foreheads together, Joseph peers deeply into her eyes, clouded with lust and hazy from Bliss. 

“You are ours just as we are yours, beloved. Please. Let us worship you.” 

•

Just about sums up how Rook ends-up in a polyamorous relationship with The Seed Bros. 

•

Transitioning between the three brothers - every month, every four weeks, like a fucking schedule, she can just imagine the three of them huddled in front of a calendar, planning this whole thing out - is nothing short of whiplash.

Rook is far from complaining.

Because it certainly has its perks.

Jacob

Rook arrives at the Veteran’s Center at 8:00 A.M. sharp.

Has breakfast with the soldiers, cracking a few jokes here and there, reminiscent of the old days, the better days, of her service. 

Training. Harsh, intense training. Jacob hurls Rook into trials, exercises, drills until the sun has sunken far below the horizon, the moon taking its place amongst the gleaming stars, wolves howling ominously, forebodingly, comfortingly in the distance.

Jacob doesn’t do PDA, and she doesn’t particularly mind. But if a couple of soldiers talk to Rook for a few minutes too long, he’ll miraculously appear out of thin air, a heavy arm slung around her shoulders, tucking her against a sturdy chest, icy blue eyes glaring piercing daggers.

“Don’t have anywhere to be, soldiers?”

Mine.

Rook’d be lying if she said she didn’t enjoy the feeling — of being possessed, owned, claimed.

She snakes an arm around his waist, buries her face in his throat, earning a chuff of amusement from him as his men flush at the open display of affection and rush off to their respective positions. 

Yours.

That first night, they fuck like it’s the last time they’ll ever do so, fingers boring into vulnerable flesh with a vengeance, teeth marking the expanse of bared necks and shoulders, blatant reminders that she is his and he is hers. 

The morning after, he doesn’t let Rook leave his (their) room without his jacket, dropping it over her shoulders, pecking a chaste kiss to her temple. 

“Get a move on, pup.”

Rook salutes dutifully - “Sir, yessir.” - before sneaking a kiss to the line of his jaw and sauntering out of his room. 

She doesn’t know it, but when she’s there, Jacob is truly at peace. 

Things fall into place, the workload doesn’t seem anywhere near as cumbersome and if things do get strenuous, he’s reminded that he’ll wash away the day’s grit with a hot shower with his perfect soldier, with his insatiable pup, with his baby girl.

The night/morning before Rook leaves for John, there isn’t as much as a morsel of the brutality of that first night. 

There’s a reverence in his actions - when he hoists her into his lap, as he rests against the headboard, thrusting up into her delicious heat, growling deep in his chest at the sight of the deputy - his deputy - coming apart, literally and figuratively. 

That night, he cradles her in his arms, bracketing her against his chest, one broad hand splayed across the small of her back, the fingers of its opposite weaving delicately through her hair.

Though part of him urges him to go to sleep, because this would be the last night of fitful rest he’d have in weeks, the rest of him doesn’t want to miss a single second, because she isn’t going to be in his arms like this for eight-fucking-weeks.

Had he been sharing Rook with anyone else - anyone that wasn’t his brothers - Jacob would’ve slaughtered them.

As it is, he splits his last few hours with her in-half.

The first-half is combing his fingers through her hair, smiling at the contented purr his ministrations evoke, dropping a kiss to her temple when she does so, humming ‘Only You’ softly against her temple.

The second-half is succumbing to sleep, the last few hours of peaceful slumber he’ll be having for weeks because she’s the only thing that keeps the nightmares at bay. 

Jacob squeezes her tight against him as he dozes off, a selfish, greedy part of him wanting to meld her against him, to keep her forever, to never let her go. 

Jacob —> John

Hoo. Boy. Does that first day throw Rook’s head for a spin. 

More so than Jacob’s cutthroat trials. 

8:00 A.M. on the dot, just like Jacob. 

Rook thought that Jacob was anal about punctuality, but John is nothing short of a child when it comes to this ‘sharing’, whining if she’s so much as a minute late. 

When Rook arrives at his ranch, John is waiting on the porch, bouncing on his heels, like a lover waiting for their sweetheart to return from deployment.

The thought makes something in her chest ache, bittersweet and longing.

He all but scoops Rook out of her Jeep, slinging her rucksack over his shoulder, leading her by the hand into his home, into his room, into his shower to wash off the dirt and grime of the mountains.

Totally not the stench of the wolves or his brother.

Rook isn’t a sap, not much of a romantic either, but the first day back with John is the closest thing she’s had to domesticity in her life.

Because they don’t fuck - they take it slow, thorough, steady - exploring each other’s bodies as if it were the first time all over again.

The rest of the day is spent in bed, John curled against her side, his head tucked under her chin, as Rook cards her fingers through his hair, humming absentmindedly.

Very similar to how Jacob holds her.

Rook wonders if she invoked the feeling of safety, protection, adoration in John, just as Jacob does for her. 

“I hate it when you leave,” John mumbles into the skin of her throat, his lips ghosting over her pulse.

Rook’s arms tighten around his waist, tugging him closer even though there wasn’t an inch of space between them, kissing the creased lines above the bridge of his nose. 

“I know, sweetheart... But I’m here now.”

His arms tighten around her, to the point where their bodies are so closely fused together Rook can feel his heart beating against her chest - a strong, steady rhythm that has her kissing his hair, assuring herself that he is very much alive.

Because sometimes, she has nightmares about his death, about him being killed, about his blood seeping through her fingers. 

John indulges in the sin carved into his skin - SLOTH - when Rook stays with him. 

For the first few days. 

Because she reminds him that he has duties to attend to, that there’s work-to-be-done, that she’s happy to be of service in any way he sees fit (on top of the fantastic sex, of course). 

Rook saves him from falling too deep - into his sin and into insanity.

Whether he’s basking in his sin when they haven’t left the ranch in two days or when he’s running himself haggard, minutes away from passing out stone-cold because of the work he buries himself in...

Rook is there to bring him back, coax him out of it, reassurances and praises spilling from her lips like molten honey, warm and sweet and delicious. 

She cooks breakfast in the mornings (with John nipping at her neck, fiddling with the buttons of his button-down that accentuates her figure oh-so-beautifully, fingers dancing along the exposed skin of her thighs) and dinner at night.

John had tried to reciprocate the gesture - on a handful of different occasions - but after nearly burning his ranch down each and every time (she didn’t have to ask who cooked The Watery Mac n’ Cheese for the barbecue), Rook makes him promise that he won’t touch the stove, oven or microwave without a vigilant eye.

•

The mornings that Rook leaves for Joseph’s island are always hard.

She does her best not to wake him, to slip out of his ranch unseen and unheard, but John has become addicted to her.

The second he hears the water running in the shower, he’s very much awake and scheming various ways to get her back in their bed.

“Where are you going, darling?”

“You know where, baby.”

John’s jaw tightens, clenches, twitches in anger, defiance, petulance.

“Don’t you love me?” 

Rook pauses, and he thinks that he’s about to get an earful about how he’s being dramatic, how Joseph would give the two of them the lecture of a lifetime for being greedy, selfish, envious, how she wasn’t the one who designed it like this. 

But he doesn’t. 

Instead, Rook cups his bearded cheek in her calloused palm and kisses him. 

The venom leaks right out of him with this single action, as his arms wind around her waist, desperate to drag her back into the sheets that were losing her delectable warmth, her intoxicating aroma, her addictive taste, wrap her in his comforter so thoroughly that it’d be like trying to break out of a Rubik’s cube, barricade the door so that she’ll never leave and no one could take her.

Their mouths part, but greed takes hold of him - it’s become more prevalent than ever these days - as John chases after Rook’s fleeting lips with the hunger of a starved man.

“I’ll be back soon, John,” Rook assures him, a smile curving her mouth, promise gleaming in her eyes. 

Four weeks with Joseph.

Four weeks with Jacob.

Eight weeks until he’d see her, feel her, taste her again. 

“Please... Just a few more minutes...?” John asks, breathless - but he knows he’s victorious by the hesitation under his fingers, the deliberation of what a few minutes really means, taking Rook’s hand in his, splaying it across his chest, where her fingers trace across his sin - S L O T H - where he begs that she’ll take the hint and join him. 

But it turns darker, lust and possession taking hold of him, biting hickeys that would last for days, until he’d see her again, into the vulnerable skin of Rook’s neck and shoulders. 

But then she turns it around - from violent to compassionate to worship - as she switches their roles, pinning him to the bed effortlessly with her wiry, lithe frame, riding him slowly - torturously, exquisitely, deliciously - into the mattress.

“You feel so fucking good, John. Fucking perfect. Let me hear you, baby. C’mon. You make the loveliest noises.” 

John comes with a shout, his orgasm ripping through him as she milks him of every last drop.

“So good for me, John...”

There’s the lightest touch to his temple as his eyes slip closed - exhausted, satiated, euphoric.

A kiss. 

“So absolutely perfect.”

•

When John wakes - to Rook’s absence, disappointment and gloom taking root in his stomach - he shuffles to the bathroom, only to find very similar marks scattered amongst his shoulders and throat. 

His fingers trace the marks - the smirk across his face growing with each one - pride flooding his veins, swelling his chest. 

‘Carve up a masterpiece while I’m gone.’ - R. 

God, he loves her. 

John —> Joseph

Joseph unnerves Rook the most.

Because he’s so earnest, sincere, kind.

He thinks she’s worthy of redemption, atonement, salvation.

He couldn’t be farther from the truth.

•

He’s visibly distraught over the marks and bruises that his brothers leave, but Rook brushes them off, says that she’s had much worse with less love.

This shakes him, deeply, lights the fuel of wrath that he thought he’d extinguished, wants nothing more than to hunt down anyone and everyone who’s devastated her, hurt her, touched her.

But Rook tells him that she wanted them to do it, that they could’ve - should’ve - done much worse.

Joseph shakes his head, says that they shouldn’t damage her body, her vessel, her temple - but when Rook says that she likes it, he realizes... 

It’s all she’s ever known. 

Pain. Anguish. Suffering. 

But John and Jacob don’t take it that step too far.

Because it’s all they’ve ever known, too. 

Before her. 

He traces the scars she’s accumulated over the years with revering fingers, amazed and horrified by the visceral canvas of her skin, asks how she received each and every one.

“Shrapnel from a frag grenade.”

“Stabbed. Ambushed.”

“Gunshot. Plenty of those. Can’t remember the story behind every one.” 

•

The first time they’re intimate (Rook’s never referred to sex so eloquently before, but with Joseph, it feels wrong to refer to it as just fucking), she tears up.

Because Joseph won’t let her get her hands on him - worships her body, reveres her scars, murmurs praise against her skin. 

And Rook can’t handle it. 

Because she doesn’t deserve this, she deserves Jacob’s rough touch - painful and euphoric, familiar and grounding - or giving John the love he deserves, has been denied so long, fulfilling his desperate pleas for affection. 

Joseph stops when he notices the tears pooling in her eyes.

“Beloved, what’s wrong?”

Rook hides her face in her hands.

“Don’t... Don’t...” She whispers, crackled, like a broken radio, bolts of pain ripping through Joseph’s soul for being the reason for those tears. 

“You don’t want me?” Joseph asks, unable to stop the hurt that floods his voice at this information, his hands trembling around her waist. 

“I don’t deserve you.”

“Oh, my beautiful girl...”

Delicately, like she’s cracked glass that could shatter with the lightest bit of pressure, he pries Rook’s hands away from her face, kissing her hands slowly, tasting the salt in the lines of her palms.

“You deserve so much more. You deserve everything. You deserve the world, the moon, the stars above.”

Rook shakes her head viciously, like she’s trying to purge the words from her eardrums, like they have the potential to leak inside her skull and tear her apart from the inside.

“No. No, Joseph. The only thing I deserve is a fucking bullet in my skull—“

Joseph cuts her off, kisses her quiet, swallows the rest of that sentence whole because he couldn’t hear it, he wouldn’t hear it.

“Don’t ever say that again,” he snarls against her lips, the noise foreign to both of them, but he’s never felt so helpless before. 

“You are our light. You are our redemption. You are our savior.”

“I... I had visions. Of their deaths. Faith. John. Jacob. Dying by your hands. Because of decisions you, me, all of us made. They were dead and you’d killed them.”

That doesn’t surprise Rook. 

But the mere idea of John, Jacob and Faith - bloodied and broken, lifeless, blank, empty eyes staring up at nothing - is enough to make something in her chest lurch, as if someone had reached down her throat and squeezed her heart until it threatened to pop. 

“But instead, you saved us. For the first time in years, John’s joy is authentic, smiling like the sweet boy he used to be, that I thought we’d lost to his horrific childhood.”

“Jacob is healing, acknowledging his wounds and making a conscious effort to not sink back into the darkness that threatened to swallow him whole.”

“I... I doubted The Voice. Everything it’d said, the visions I’d had before, leading to the death of my family. I was furious. I was confused. I was devastated. But... Now I see.” 

Calloused fingers brush away her tears and the salty tracks they left behind.

“It’s you. It’s always been you. You were the beginning and the end. You’d be the one who’d save us. And I love you so very, very much...”

Oh. 

Oh, shit. 

He’s crying. 

He... 

He’s crying.

“Joseph, please don’t cry...”

Rook isn’t the best with intimate situations, has been on this earth for thirty years, has only found herself in a handful in said time-frame, but what she can say with absolute certainty is that dismantling a bomb isn’t nearly as nerve-wracking as dealing with emotions.

But Joseph Seed isn’t a panel full of wires, meaning there isn’t a singular one she could cut to defuse the situation. 

Rook does the only thing she can think of. 

Cups his cheeks in her shaky fingers, thumbing away the drops that stain his face, kissing every inch of his face until the tears stop, until she’s kissing his lips, licking his mouth open, until all she can taste is salt, chamomile, honey and something so intense, so grounding, so foreign because her life didn’t have a trace of domesticity before this.

“Angel... You’re an angel,” Joseph gasps against her lips, taking control of the situation in such a way that Rook doesn’t realize it until his fingers nimbly maneuver her button and zipper, until she’s lifting her hips, until she’s dripping from the combination of his silver tongue and her slick, until he’s buried to the hilt inside her, their fingers laced together in one hand, his free hand reaching down to rub tight, precise, delicious circles where she aches for it, her free hand tangled in the long locks that she’d freed from that ridiculous fucking bun.

Rook doesn’t think she’s an angel - if anything, an angel of death with the amount of carnage she wreaks anywhere she goes - but if Joseph thinks she is and treats her like this? 

Shit, she might just go out and buy a halo. 

•

Jacob gives her his dog tags.

John gives her his rings - three platinum bands, two for her right hand, one for her left - takes unadulterated pleasure in seeing the gleaming band upon her left ring finger, the insinuation behind it and the weight of the gesture not lost on her.

Joseph gives her his rosary, wraps it around her right wrist like a bracelet, the cross nestled comfortably in her palm.

They’re all subtle, things that most people wouldn’t look twice at, but to Rook, they mean the world and then some.

When the brothers notice the look of guilt across Rook’s face, they ask her what’s wrong.

“I... I don’t have anything to give you. Any of you. I’m sorry, I—“

“Darling, don’t you know?” John tucks himself against her right side, nosing at her cheek, laying sharp kisses to the line of her jaw.

“You’ve given each of us a piece of your heart, honey,” Jacob’s burly arms lock around her waist from her left side, holding her steady against his bulk, lingering kisses leaving a searing trail from her throat to the hollow of her collarbone. 

“That is the greatest gift of all, beloved,” Joseph stands in front of her, his fingers loosely tangled in her hair, their foreheads resting together in the most intimate of gestures this family knows, peering into her eyes without those fucking aviators to obscure how ridiculously, incomprehensibly, beautifully blue his eyes are. 

Rook isn’t crying.

You’re crying.

**Author's Note:**

> P.S. - the asterisk (*) is to indicate that the line is a quote, borrowed from Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift, one of the most underrated movies of our generation. Highly recommend checking out the song ‘This Is My Mexico’ by Brian Tyler - beautiful song for an exceptional scene. R.I.P, Han.


End file.
